Songs of the Chaos
by IridiumRing92
Summary: A collection of Lightning Returns-based one-shots related to my music. Note: They're really random! R&R! #5: Crave You. "The breeze toyed with her rose-colored hair, tossing it this way and that, but the rest of her was silent and motionless as crystal. Not to mention, Caius thought, just as beautiful."
1. Seven Devils

**Title:** Darkest Memory

**Song: **Seven Devils by Florence + the Machine

**Lyrics:** _Seven devils all around you / Seven devils in my heart_

_They were there when I woke up this morning / And I'll be dead before the day is done_

_Seven devils all around you / Seven devils in your heart_

_I was dead when I woke up this morning / And I'll be dead before the day is done_

**Pairings: **CaiusxLightning

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Final Fantasy. Or the song.

**A/N: **So, hey you guys. I'm on spring break right now so I'm super bored... And I'm playing lots of video games. Every day I randomize my music playlist and see what comes up, and then I have to write a fanfic about whatever it is... so here's my first one for LR. Hope you like :3

* * *

**Darkest Memory**

Lightning walked out into the center of the temple of the goddess. Here the walls no longer closed in around her. The ceiling was a cracked mess of debris, opening to a sea of stars in an inky sky. But even though the fresh air was a welcome change from the cramped space of the bowels of the temple, she could still feel the unwelcome presences surrounding her.

"I know you're there," she whispered into the night air, her voice echoing in the space around her. "Come out and fight."

"Ah, so the savior finally calls," a voice said.

The voice rang familiar, but it was from somewhere deep in her memory. She had kept it buried there for hundreds—thousands—of years, after all, and something told her it would have been better off staying buried.

Caius Ballad's feet touched the ground in front of her, and his eyes locked onto hers, a smirk creeping onto his face.

"I have been waiting for you to come out and fight for hundreds of years," he growled.

Lightning drew her sword, and he mimicked her, drawing his own. It was a scene reminiscent of their duels in Valhalla so long ago, but though it should have elicited fury and adrenaline from her, she no longer felt any of it.

Instead, she felt an empty numbness, a hole in her chest where those emotions should have been. She felt the presence of thousands of souls surrounding the temple, souls that had been lost in the Void Beyond. She felt the curse he had placed on her when she'd entered the temple, eating away slowly at her strength.

And when she looked into Caius's eyes, she thought she sensed some of that in him as well. Did he feel anymore, after millions of years of watching his seeress die, after an eternity fighting Lightning in the middle of that timeless realm, with no result?

There was only one way to know.

Lightning walked closer to Caius, trying to bring back the feeling she'd come to grips with in Valhalla. One side of her had felt a furious want of blood, a screaming urge to end the fight once and for all. The other side of her had always wished she could step back and do what she was about to do now.

She stopped right where she was, and in one swift movement she disarmed him of his weapon, dropping her own on the stone floor next to her. Then, taking advantage of the quiet moment, she took one more step forward.

Lightning crushed her lips to his.

There was a moment, at first, when he tried to push her away, but that moment soon evaporated, and he was leaning into her. For a minute they stayed that way, neither of them moving.

Finally, Lightning stepped back.

Caius stared at her for a second longer before he slumped to his knees. "Lightning," he said under his breath. "I… I apologize."

Lightning laughed a short, sharp laugh. "And Yeul told me I couldn't save you," she remarked.

* * *

**A/N: **There will be more of these soon! R&R if you feel like it.


	2. Papercut

**Title:** Inside Voices

**Song: **Papercut by Linkin Park

**Lyrics: **_ It's like I'm paranoid, looking over my back / It's like a whirlwind inside of my head_

_It's like I can't stop what I'm hearing within / It's like the face inside is right beneath my skin…_

_The sun goes down / I feel the light betray me_

**Pairings: **NONE.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Final Fantasy. Or the song.

**A/N: **Aaahhh, I didn't update as soon as I would have liked. Oh well... Anyway, I realize this story doesn't really cover that much new ground, but if you know the song, you'll get it. Hehehe. R&R if you want!

* * *

**Inside Voices**

Lightning stood in front of the Luxerion North Station. The people around her, once full of life and motion, were now frozen, not one of them moving even an inch. Even the clock on the edifice of the station had stopped.

She could sense the presence behind her before the voice ever spoke, but she didn't dare turn around.

"Oh, Lightning. Fancy meeting you here," a light, cheerful voice chirped.

"Lumina," she growled, rolling her eyes.

"You bet! Oh, how could you tell it was me?" Lumina pouted. "You must be getting better at this Chaos stuff."

"Chaos stuff," Lightning muttered. "Look, Lumina, I have places to be. And I have no business making small talk with you while the world's time stops ticking."

"Small talk! Is that what you think this is?" Lumina demanded. Then she sighed. "I guess you won't ever figure it out by yourself, will you?"

Finally, Lightning slowly spun around and looked at the girl. "What does that mean?"

"It means… It means I have something for you," Lumina answered with an attempt at an innocent grin. Her expression looked devious instead.

"What is it?" Lightning muttered suspiciously.

"Wait for it…" Lumina said. She paced back and forth in front of Lightning, staring up at the midnight sky. Then she shouted, "Here!"

She swung her arm toward Lightning, and a blast of light shrieked through the air, hitting Lightning square in the chest. She stumbled backwards, trying to find her footing again, but her legs gave out under her and she ended up on the ground, on her hands and knees.

"Oh, I'm so sorry!" Lumina gasped. "Oh no, Lightning, what are you going to do now? You're the same as Vanille. You're cursed!"

"Cursed?! What the hell do you mean, cursed?" Lightning demanded.

"Can't you hear them?" Lumina asked. "Listen. Can't you hear the voices of the lost souls?"

Lightning was about to ask her what she meant again, but the girl disappeared into the Chaos, and time around her resumed, leaving her crouched in the middle of a crowd that undulated around her, giving her no space of her own. And then she heard it—a sea of voices forming at the edge of her consciousness, a wave threatening to crash against her mind. Some were talking, some singing, and still others were screaming. It felt like they were coming straight from the crowd.

"Light?" A voice cut through her thoughts, coming from her communicator. She realized that it could only be Hope. "Light, are you there? I lost my signal for a minute."

Lightning's expression contorted into one of confusion and despair as the voices in her head grew louder. She could make out words now; she could hear what they were screaming about, all at once.

"Lightning?" Hope asked again.

Lightning collapsed on the pavement in front of the station, clamping her hands over her ears, squeezing her eyes shut, trying to block out the noise.


	3. Faint

**Title:** Faint

**Song: **Faint by Linkin Park

**Lyrics: **_So I let go watching you / Turn your back like you always do_

_Face away and pretend that I'm not / But I'll be here cause you're all that I've got_

_I can't feel the way I did before / Don't turn your back on me, I won't be ignored_

_Time won't heal this damage anymore_

_Don't turn your back on me, I won't be ignored  
_

**Pairings: **CaiusxLightning. Sort of.

**Disclaimer:** I still don't own Final Fantasy. Or the song.

**A/N: **I have returned. Lol, a lot of Linkin Park songs apply to Caius. This fanfic hardly has anything to do with the actual story of LR, so apologies if that bugs you. Also, it appears that Light and Caius have somewhat of a history from XIII-2 in this one... I wish that were actually true.

* * *

**Faint**

Lightning stood not twenty feet away from Caius, but he didn't give any indication of knowing that she was there. He stood staring out at nothing, his fists clenched at his sides, his sword staked vertically in the ground next to him. Did she dare call out his name, or take a step closer? For a minute she could only watch as the breeze blew strands of his lavender hair back and forth.

"Caius Ballad."

He swiveled to face her, his eyes unforgiving. His hand wavered at the hilt of his sword, but he didn't pick it up.

"Lightning."

His lips barely moved as he spoke her name, his voice scratchy from what she knew had been days of shouting.

Lightning stood her ground. She pushed back memories of their time in Valhalla; she couldn't afford to get emotional. Except, maybe, for anger. She could get angry at him, she allowed herself that. Anything else would be less than necessary.

"What do you want?" Caius demanded through clenched teeth. His voice was no louder than a whisper.

"I want to talk to you." Lightning took three steps forward, advancing on him.

But when she had reached that third step, Caius turned away again. "No," he growled. "I refuse."

"Don't turn your back on me, Caius Ballad," Lightning snapped, closing the distance between them with a few more steps. Her hand latched onto his shoulder, and she spun him around, forcing him to face her. "Don't you remember Valhalla? How can you possibly forget that?"

"The endless war?" he asked quietly, averting his eyes.

"No, Caius. Not the war." Lightning tried to look him in the eye. He was purposely making it harder for her, his eyes flickering around her gaze. "Us. You and me. Fighting the paradoxes, together."

"Forgive me if I no longer remember."

"I know you remember, Caius. I can't forgive you," she shot back. "Trust me, after all this time has passed, you probably expect me to have let it go. But that's _not_ going to happen."

"Lightning!" Caius snarled, rounding on her. His stare was like a burn on her retinas. "You are the reason I lost everything, and now you demand I take you back? In what dimension does that make sense?"

"Caius, I think you need to wake up," Lightning answered. "If I have to drag you out of this temple, I will."

She drew her blade and, in one swift motion, pointed it at his heart. He couldn't mask the gasp that escaped him.

"See what I mean?" she hissed. "You don't want to face death, even after all this time."

His hand closed around the blade. "Not by your hand," he admitted softly.


	4. Runnin'

**Title:** Run

**Song: **Runnin' by Cutline

**Lyrics: **_I keep runnin', runnin', something within / Taking its hold on me_

_There's a feeling inside I try to hide / Taking control of me_

_Like it or not, the things I've been shown / They keep on driving me_

_Now I'm high with the clouds, lifting above / Starlight is all I see_

**Pairings: **None

**Disclaimer:** Nope, don't own Final Fantasy. Or the song.

**A/N:** So this was the song I got this time. It turned out like "Inside Voices", kind of a "what if" part of the story... Anyway, yeah.

* * *

**Run**

Lightning had long known this was coming. All of her venturing into the Chaos, fighting the monsters there, coming into contact with their darkness and taking damage from them. She'd been left a few too many times in a web of Chaos, on her knees, preparing to let go.

And every time, she'd been saved by some miracle. Some miracle more likely known as Bhunivelze.

But even the power of her god wasn't enough. She knew that. Or, at least, she _should_ have known that. But she'd been all over Nova Chrysalia trying to banish the Chaos, ignoring the consequences.

She knelt on the pavement in front of the train station in Luxerion. It was the middle of the night, and no one else was there but Lightning. Though she knew that, she found herself looking around to make sure no one was watching. She put a hand over her heart and felt the Chaos unfold around her.

Immediately her comm device beeped. _"Light? Are you there?" _Hope's voice asked, coming in through the static. _"Can you hear me? I'm getting lots of Chaos readings."_

"Yeah, Hope, I can hear you," she replied, lifting her eyes to see the darkness spreading.

_"What's going on? Is there anyone else there?"_ Hope inquired.

"No, I don't think so. I think it's just a regular Chaos spawn," Lightning told him. "It'll probably go away once I defeat whatever's in the center."

_"Okay. Be careful, Light," _Hope reminded her before her comm device clicked off again.

Lightning looked up again. She knew very well that this wasn't a regular Chaos spawn, and that it probably wasn't going to go away. She could already feel the Chaos infecting her on the inside, weaving its shadowy fingers through her core. At first she focused on taking deep breaths and accepting its presence inside her.

"I can accept this," she whispered. "I can be light and shadow at the same time. I can be the savior and the…"

_"Are you talking to someone?"_ Hope's voice broke into her impromptu monologue, his question echoing through her earpiece. She flinched. _"Did someone else show up?"_

"No, Hope," Lightning answered. "No one's here, I told you."

_"Then what—?" _he began.

Lightning cut him off midsentence. "Please, wait until I'm done here. Then I promise I'll tell you what's going on."

_"If you insist, Light,"_ he answered, and the sound clicked off.

She was about to stand up and walk away, but something stopped her. The Chaos, shackling her, pinning her to Luxerion's pavement with its shadowy tendrils. She took a deep breath.

And then she rose to her feet. She broke free of the hold the Chaos had on her, and she ran. Her feet pounded the ground below her as she sprinted, and she felt air rushing to fill her lungs. A thought nagged at the back of her mind: that she wouldn't be able to outrun the Chaos, no matter how far she went.

But she kept running.


	5. Crave You

**Title:** Crave You

**Song: **Crave You by Flight Facilities and Adventure Club

**Lyrics: **_Why can't you want me like the other boys do? / They stare at me while I stare at you_

_Why can't I keep you safe as my own? / One moment I have you the next you are gone…_

_It's true I crave you_

_Let's just stop and think, before I lose face / Surely I can't fall into a game of chase_

**Pairings: **CaiusxLightning

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Final Fantasy or the song.

**A/N: **Another Caius and Lightning ship. Hey, they're fun. :3

* * *

**Crave You**

She was sitting on the edge of one of the half stone walls, one leg crossed over the other and her gunblade cradled in her lap. The breeze toyed with her rose-colored hair, tossing it this way and that, but the rest of her was silent and motionless as crystal. Not to mention, Caius thought, just as beautiful.

* * *

She had long turned off her communication device. She didn't want to hear Hope's voice in her ear anymore, not when the sound brought back memories of the two of them and their endeavor on Gran Pulse. She'd turned him away once, but he still kept talking to her, like it didn't matter.

Lightning thought of Caius just the day before, when she'd seen him standing at the top of the temple, his shadow outlined in the dying light. When she thought of him, for some reason, the fights were the last thing that came to her mind. Instead she found herself aching to touch him, to be close to him. She always had to push those thoughts away.

But on days like these, when she was left sitting on one of the walls, her communication device dead and the silence very alive, it was hard to keep them from coming into her head.

"Lightning?" Caius's voice echoed off the stone fragments around her, eventually finding her ears, deep and husky. The voice she'd come to hate and crave at once.

"Caius," she muttered, turning her head just slightly to face him.

* * *

She blinked, and her eyelashes fluttered against her pale skin. Her lips pursed into a thin line as she looked over her shoulder at him. One hand curled involuntarily around the handle of her gunblade. "What is it?" she asked.

"What is it," Caius echoed. "What, indeed."

Lightning glared at him. He leaned forward and took one of her hands in his.

"The fight is over," he told her. "You needn't act so guarded around me anymore."

He watched her expression shift from annoyance to surprise, her eyebrows rising and her lips parting slightly. "What do you mean?" she stammered.

* * *

"I have watched you watch me for the past few days, Lightning."

Her face twisted in confusion. "What… what are you saying?" she demanded, her fingers closing in a death grip on her weapon, as though she was preparing to swing it at him.

"I am saying…" Caius paused, his gaze drifting. "Surrender to your heart's desire."

"Caius, I don't—"

He cut her off by leaning down and meeting her mouth with his, and the silence enveloped them again. His thumb traced across her cheek; her hand fell away from her gunblade. Caius stepped back, satisfied.

"Caius—" Lightning began again. After a moment she managed to say, "How did you know?"

"Lucky guess," he answered with a smirk just before he turned away.


End file.
